Around 130 people were arrested on Tuesday in a large-scale sting against the Sicilian mafia in Palermo, indicating that it has remained a significant criminal force despite setbacks in recent decades.

Though mobsters terrorised Sicily for decades, harsh crackdowns in the 1990s and early 2000s seriously weakened the Cosa Nostra, with many of its top bosses dead or imprisoned and its once-tight grip over Sicilian society relaxed.

In the early 1990s crusading anti-mafia prosecutors were murdered as they tried to hit back. Then in 1993 the so-called boss of bosses, Salvatore "Toto" Riina, was arrested in Palermo, and in 2023 notorious mobster Matteo Messina Denaro was detained as he visited a local clinic.

Carabinieri led a huge crackdown on members of the Sicilian Mafia LCN today, capturing 181 suspects in a nationwide sting.

Those arrested in the major operation, involving 1,200 carabinieri, are accused of mafia-type criminal association, attempted murder, aggravated extortion with mafia methods, drug trafficking, use and possession of weapons,